הרב יואל טייטלבוים

Rav Yoel Teitelbaum (17 Tevet 5647/1887–26 Av 5739/1979), the Satmar Rebbe — “Reb Yoelish” to his chassidim — was the founder and first Rebbe of Satmar chassidut and one of the central builders of the chassidic world after the churban of Europe. He was born in Sighet, in the Marmarosh region of Hungary, the second son of Rav Chananyah Yom Tov Lipa Teitelbaum, the Sigheter Rav, a descendant of Rav Moshe Teitelbaum, talmid of the Chozeh of Lublin and one of the fathers of chassidut in Hungary. At his bar mitzvah he delivered a derashah of several hours on a sugya in masechet Shabbat, and before his marriage he already held semichah from eight rabbanim, among them Rav Moshe Greenwald. Days before his father’s petirah in 5664/1904 he married Chava, daughter of Rav Avraham Chaim Horowitz of Plantch.

In 5665/1905 he settled in Satmar, where his chassidim opened a beit midrash for him despite his youth. He became rav of Orshiva in 5671/1911, av beit din of Krula in 5685/1925 — he is known also as the Krula Rav — and after the sudden petirah of his older brother Rav Chaim Tzvi in 5686/1926, most of the Sighet chassidim looked to him as their rebbe. In 5688/1928 he was put forward for the rabbanut of Satmar itself; after long-contested communal elections he took up the post in Adar 5694/1934, and his yeshiva there, with 334 talmidim, became the largest in the city.

When the Germans overran Hungary in 1944 he was confined to the ghetto of Kolozsvar, and was included among the eighty rabbanim and notables whom Baron Fülöp von Freudiger placed on the rescue train that left Budapest on 30 June 1944. Diverted to Bergen-Belsen, the group was held there for months; the Rebbe was among those permitted to leave in Kislev 5705/December 1944, and the train carrying them crossed into Switzerland — Satmar chassidim keep 21 Kislev as the Rebbe’s Yom HaHatzalah to this day. In Elul 5705/1945 he sailed for Eretz Yisrael, and a year later traveled to America, arriving in New York on Rosh Hashanah 5707/1946. Pressed by the rabbanim there to remain and lead, he settled in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, with a core of some seventy chassidim, and on chol hamoed Pesach 5708/1948 Congregation Yetev Lev D’Satmar was founded around him.

From Williamsburg he rebuilt Satmar into a great chassidut, and in 5711/1951 he was also chosen nasi of the Edah HaChareidis of Yerushalayim. His stand against Zionism, which he held without compromise all his life, he set out at length in his Vayoel Moshe; his Torah is learned in his Divrei Yoel on the Torah and in his Teshuvot Divrei Yoel. He was niftar on 26 Av 5739/1979; the town of Kiryas Joel in New York carries his name.